


Pockets for worms

by eyeslikerain



Category: Maurice (1987), Maurice - E. M. Forster
Genre: M/M, prompt day four: golden
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-28 00:42:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17777294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eyeslikerain/pseuds/eyeslikerain
Summary: „Your dress looks nice. What‘s wrong with it?“„It doesn‘t have any pockets.“





	Pockets for worms

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Julie_Anne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Julie_Anne/gifts).



> for the lovely Julie_Anne, inspired by a cute pic on her blog and meant as a sequel to her "A heart so full". Happy Valentine's Day!
> 
> Warning: not your usual Maurice - fic!

Clive turned and ran headless out of the gate and down the cobbled street, almost colliding with a fellow on a bike. Maurice‘s decisive „Rubbish!“ echoed in his otherwise empty, pounding head. His ears buzzed while he turned a corner frantically, still at a rather fast pace which earned him suspicious looks from other pedestrians. Recognizing his surroundings only blurry, Clive hurried on and let his feet carry him wherever they wanted, mainly away fom college, Maurice and the intense shame he felt when thinking about how brutally he had reacted to Clive‘s confession of his innermost secret. Tears stung behind his eyes and he fluttered his lids rapidly to avoid them. He turned into a small, quiet street and leant against a brick wall. He bent forward, rested his hands on his thighs and tried to catch his breath. Running like a thief through Cambridge, jacket-less, hat-less, in a certainly dishevelled state, was madness. Clive, ever composed and honourable, didn‘t realize his slip until now. He hoped no-one he knew had seen him. He pulled himself together, ran a hand through his hair and tried to carry on in a normal pace. He recognized the street in his back, turned as inconspicously as he could muster into the next one and arrived at the small park he knew from passing. He needed a calm, quiet place to gather his thoughts. Shame and embarrassment still burned on his cheeks. He didn‘t know how to look into Maurice‘s eyes ever again.

The park was fairly empty at this time of the afternoon. Several benches at the entrance were unoccupied, but Clive craved loneliness and a hidden spot. He found it in the back when rounding the small ground, under a voluptous elder tree that spread it‘s large branches. The tree seemed to be quite old, but was covered nevertheless with hundreds of gracefully nodding blossoms. They exuded the peculiar, stingy scent of elderflowers Clive never had liked, but he decided on this place anyway.

Clive sat down heavily on the bench. He felt a hundred years old. He got out his handkerchief and wiped his sweaty forehead and upper lip. Why had Maurice reacted as violently? Had he read him all wrong? Had he seen more in the intimate embrace on the creaky chair than there was to it? Sure, it was Clive who had initiated the encounter. He shouldn‘t have climbed onto Maurice‘s lap. He shouldn‘t. Even if the urge had been more than he could tolerate at this fatal moment. He shouldn‘t have gone to his room at all. Being all alone with a fellow student – who did this? Look at Chapman and his crowd. They are healthy. They behave like healthy men do. Maurice is one of them also. How could Clive ignore - 

Suddenly, the dense lower branches of the tree in his back rustled. Clive turned his head terrified only to detect a tiny head with tousled hair. An equally tiny person, clad in a frilly light yellow dress, followed. She brushed some fallen branches from her face, rounded the bench and hopped up to sit on it. Her skirt hung squashed to one side and revealed chubby, soft legs. She didn‘t seem to mind and started to swing her legs vigorously back and forth. Clive sighed inwardly and hoped the creature would leave as silently as she had appeared. He didn‘t know how to deal with children and decided to just ignore her. 

She seemed to have taken the same decision because she looked straight ahead of her, ignoring Clive in her own way, and said angrily to the lawn in front of her:

„I ran away. I‘ll never go back.“

Clive remained silent. The little girl swung her legs even more energetically and kicked a good load of gravel with her toes.

„Don‘t you want to know why I ran away?“

Clive looked into the pouty face and shook his head without saying anything. Maybe it was like with dogs? Ignore them? Don‘t react, and they‘ll stop?

„I‘ll tell you anyway.“ Clive sighed. His heart ached, and here was a – what? He couldn‘t even guess how old she was. Too young to be outside all by herself.

„I ran away because Mother made me wear this dress. I will never go back“, she added fiercely.

Clive crumbled and offered a weak:

„Your dress looks nice. What‘s wrong with it?“

„It doesn‘t have any pockets.“

„Why would you need pockets?“

„For when I need to carry a frog! Don‘t you understand?“, she cried exasperated.

„A frog?“

„Yes. I put one in cousin Annabelle‘s collar in church last sunday, and it was such great fun. Her screams were so loud in the church!“ She beamed at him, trying hard to hide a proud smile. Some more swinging of her chubby legs. „And worms also. I need pockets for worms.“

„Please don‘t tell me you take worms to church also“, Clived muttered.

„No, just, you know, for any day. Once, I put them on mademoiselle‘s salad. My uncle told me the French eat the strangest things. They eat frogs also. But I didn‘t have a frog handy that day, you see, so I collected some worms for her. And put them on her salad.“

„And?“, Clive asked, disgusted but fascinated.

„Oh, they liked her salad just fine. One even had started to nibble on a leaf“.

„No, your nanny, I mean?“

„She fainted. She did this all the time. She‘s back in France now.“

The little person turned to him and looked earnestly into his eyes:

„So, you see, I really need to have dresses with pockets. You have pockets in your trousers, don‘t you?“

Clive nodded. The girl crossed her arms and sulked:

„That‘s so unfair! Why can boys have pockets, and I have to wear this stupid dress!“ She hit her skirt angrily. The frills on the masses of organdy fluttered.

„Say“ - she turned around on the bench and came to sit backwards on it, facing Clive, letting her rumpled dress hang any way it happened to - „you look sad yourself. What happened to you?“

Clive suppressed an urge to get up and away from his chatty companion. But – where to? He didn‘t want to meet Maurice ever again. Also Chapman and the other imbeciles. The college or his usual haunts were not safe right now. He needed to feel more composed to face all this.

„I have a friend. I like him", he started and looked helplessly on the ground in front of him. „But it‘s not good that he is my friend. I should rather have other guys for friends. Can you understand it?“

She nodded and said: „And you like this friend a lot, even if you shouldn‘t have him?“

Clive nodded.

„It‘s the same with my dress. You see? I don‘t want the other one, even if mother says I should. It makes you hurt inside, doesn‘t it?“

Clive nodded again and felt new tears welling up. What a mess he was.

„But – who says you shouldn‘t have this friend?“

„The same people who say you should wear this dress.“

She looked at him puzzled:

„Mother told you so?“

„No“, Clive shook his head impatiently. „Society, I guess.“

„What is - siciety?“, she mumbled, trying out the unfamiliar word and pursing her lips intently.

„Society is – well, the world around us. The people we have to live with. Your mother, your father, mademoiselle, your piano teacher...“

„I hate her“, the girl spat out. „Mother wants me to play. I don‘t want to.“

„Don‘t you tell“, Clive smiled at her fervour. „Is there anything you like? Besides frogs?“

„Oh, many things. But tell me first – do we need to live in a - siciety? Can‘t we live all alone, and just like we wish?“

„That would mean to live outside society. You wouldn‘t see your parents anymore, your siblings, the friends from school. You‘d be all alone.“

„I would love that. Where can I move to be all alone? Can I move in with you?“

Clive couldn‘t hide a smile:

„No, you can‘t. I live in college. It‘s for boys only.“

„I know what college is“, the girl replied precociously. „My father works there.“

Drumming her hands on the backrest of the bench, she asked:

„How about London? Could I wear normal dresses there?“

„More so than here, maybe, but not everywhere.“

„Have you been there?“

Clive nodded. She stared at him with wide eyes. He seemed to have risen in the girl‘s esteem. But only shortly. Biting her lips, swinging her legs again in the most annoying fashion, she held onto the back of the bench and said:

„Tell me where I can live in England, then.“

„Nowhere, I‘m afraid“, Clive replied gloomily. „You‘d have to go… to another country, I guess.“

She frowned and kicked the air some more. Both remained silent for a few seconds until the girl chirped:

„I‘m eight. How old are you?“

„Guess“, Clive said grumpily.

„I‘m good at guessing!“, she smiled. She looked at him thoroughly and squinted her eyes:

„Really old, I‘d say.“ Clive averted his exasperated eyes. „Seventeen?“

He snorted:

„Even older.“

The incredulousy shrieked „What?“ hurt his ears.

„You don‘t want to know, believe me.“

„I never want to be as old and sad as you“, the girl stated while slowly leaning her torso back towards the ground. She secured her legs at the back of the bench and reclined fully, her silky, golden hair almost sweeping the ground. Finally, she let her arms fall beside her and glanced furtively up to Clive to see if he noticed her daring feat. Her stomach heaved with excitement and she panted slightly, but seemed very pleased with herself. Clive looked at the tiny person upside-down beside himself. Her legs were bare up to where her lacy bloomers began, the dress in a state that would give her mother a heart attack and the hair a complete mess. But she seemed content. For now. Clive sighed. When a nanny with a pram passed them, he tried to look as if it were normal for him to sit on a bench with little girls draped over the seat next to him. He tried an apologizing smile, but the nanny frowned and looked disapprovingly at the little girl‘s underwear. „Society again“, he thought, when the girl suddenly let herself go limp and crawled under the bench in a matter of seconds. A tiny foot in a white shoe and some torn yellow frills were the last he saw of her wriggling body. At the same time, a lanky boy of about twelve dashed into the park and cried:

„Marigold! Marigold!“

The elder tree rustled. The girl was gone.

The lad jogged around the circle of the park, crying her name every now and then. He even stopped in front of Clive – a tiny version of Clive himself and his friends in a tweed suit, buttoned boots and a tweed cap – and stared into the corner with the elder tree intently. Not daring to disturb the gloomy looking gentleman on the bench, he darted on, shouting „Marigold!“ once more before leaving the park.

The tree remained silent. Clive moved his head and muttered softly: „He‘s gone.“ He heard some scrambling, saw some leaves moving, but got no response. Everything was quiet after that. The girl seemed to know her secret spots.

Clive exhaled and rested his hands on his legs. He‘d have to go back. It looked like rain, and he was slightly cold without a jacket. He had to return, anyway. He couldn‘t escape and avoid college. His first impulse had been to ditch everything, escape to Pendersleigh under some pretext of feeling ill. But he‘d have to come back again some day. Face the whole muddle. Or try to act as if nothing had happened? No, that wasn‘t true. Something enormous had happened, even if it had lasted mere seconds only. He still felt Maurice‘s warm breath on his cheeks. His silky, golden hair under his fingers. His large, loving blue eyes, his deliciously warm, strong body… How could he mistake him so completely? How could he still want him so much, even after his grave insult? 

A bell tolled the hour. Clive got up slowly. He‘d have to say grace in hall this week. One more reason he couldn‘t just leave Cambridge. Slowly, he turned his steps towards the gate of the park. He felt as old as the girl had feared.


End file.
